


Dreams

by Monochromely



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 09:13:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17139044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Monochromely/pseuds/Monochromely
Summary: On the Maheswarans' doorstep one evening, Priyanka thanks Pearl.





	Dreams

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thesometimeswarrior](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesometimeswarrior/gifts).



> _Prompt:_ Priyanka Maheswaran and Pearl having a conversation about Connie.
> 
> A gift to thesometimeswarrior for a holiday fic exchange.

On the porch steps leading into the Maheswarans’ townhouse, Priyanka Maheswaran and Pearl sit side by side, waiting for their respective kids _to finish one more episode, please_? It takes a lot of cajoling for them both to say yes—some puppy dog eyes, a vow from Connie to wash dishes, and a hilariously hyperbolic promise from Steven that he’ll never ask for anything ever again.

Like, ever.

(“I hold you to that,” deadpanned Pearl.)

But it’s a Saturday evening, and the sky is heavy with a lazy kind of twilight; they say yes and decide to enjoy the slight breeze running through their hair rather than suffer through another second of _Crying Breakfast Friends_. A mug of black coffee smolders between Priyanka’s hands, steam spiraling up into the air like a long, silky ribbon. They watch all of the many cars go by; they lean against the concrete steps and enjoy the world as it comes to them.

It is quiet.

Peaceful.

“Pearl?” She asks after a long while of this, quite suddenly, if purposefully, breaking that somnolent spell.

“Hm?”

Priyanka tilts her head back to where Steven’s guardian is sitting on the next step up from her, her long, pale hands a contemplative temple on her lap. Out of Steven’s _motley_ guardians, she appears and acts the most human-like, well assimilating into the role of the concerned parent, sensible and involved. But her eyes… her eyes tell a different story, the doctor thinks, learning to be observant of all these little details. (She’d been so busy before—not by necessity but by choice and ignorance, negligence. She hadn’t even realized her own daughter had popped her lenses out, had been seeing 20/20 for months on end because she drank Steven Universe’s magical spit.) Pearl’s eyes have always had a distinct alien quality to them—the expression in them, not the form—as though they are always looking to a place beyond mortal reach.

“While we have this opportunity, I wanted to thank you for what you’ve done for Connie.” Again, it seems sudden, but she’s been mulling this over for a long time now, methodically deconstructing all of her careful lines between logic and emotion to get to this point.

To feel _gratitude_ and want to express it in words.

And she _is_ grateful—she is.

“She’s been a different child altogether these last couple of months,” she says, her voice low and throaty. “Happier. Lighter.”

Her twelve-year old looks more alive with a sword in her hand than she _ever_ did with a tennis racket.

(As ludicrous as it sounds, it feels like a condemnation, a failure on some behalf of her own.)

“Oh, ah, thank you,” Pearl begins, obviously taken by surprise. Her eyes widen, and a blue blush scribbles itself across the bridge of her nose, deepened in shade and intensity by the inky sky, by the singular porch light flickering warmly above them. “But really, you can’t give me _all_ of the credit. It’s Steven who has truly been there for her—not to mention the internal growth she herself has effected through her own volition, as well as meditation with Garnet and, unfortunately, loosening up with Amethyst from time to time—and, well…” Her clumsy rambling trails off, and those distant blue eyes light upon Priyanka with a certain softness to them, a kindness. “And then there’s you.”

“Me?” Priyanka can’t help but laugh. In her harsh mouth, it sounds like an incredulous bark. “I dealt her her damage, Pearl. I suffocated her and tried to protect her from every quantifiable danger—which weren’t really dangers at all. I made her feel like she could never talk to me, that she had to _lie_ to me to make me happy.” 

“You did those things, yes,” Pearl agrees, “but that was _then,_ Priyanka. What are you doing _now_?”

 _Now_ —that’s the operative word, isn’t it?

Now, she’s letting Connie go over to the temple at least three times a week, so she can play with Steven and work in some sword training.

Now, she’s texting her daughter while she’s on break, checking up on her, calling when she can.

 _How was your day?_ She asks.

 _Tell me about it._ She eagerly implores.

She told her she could quit tennis if she wanted to as long as she kept up her grades.

 _But you don’t have to be perfect, Connie_ , she added as a studied afterthought, a compromise. _An ‘A-‘ is fine every now and then… and maybe occasionally, a ‘B.’_

When she gets home late at night, she’ll quietly pry open Connie’s door and tiptoe in; she’ll smooth her daughter’s sheets.

Sometimes, she’ll kiss her lightly on the forehead.

She’s trying.

She is.

(In a couple of weeks more, she’s going to let her daughter fly off to space in a pink ship comprised of legs and an ass.)

“See?” Pearl smirks, rightfully taking Priyanka’s stunned silence for what it is. Contemplation. Realization. _Relief._ “You don’t give yourself enough credit.”

“But neither do you,” she retorts gruffly, overwhelmed by the sudden emotion and trying to stall it out. “She dreams of adventure and sword fighting and protecting others because of you.”

“But she’s enabled to dream these things because she has your support.”

Pearl’s smile is small but gentle, understanding and empathetic both.

She continues on, looking away from Priyanka and out to the open street, where car are still rambling on to their final destinations. Their headlights rove across the pale plane of Pearl’s face.

“Steven’s mother—Rose…” It’s a simple enough name, but on Pearl’s tongue, it sounds incredibly heavy, like a weight, a burden; at the very same time, it sounds very much like a loss, too. “… she enabled _me_ to dream those sorts of dreams, where I couldn’t before. You see, I once dreamt of Diamonds, or more often than not, nothing at all. But because of her, I learned to dream of freedom and swords, protecting others, and _loving_ them.”

These words are softly spoken, sanctified by this quiet night.

Priyanka does not quite understand _everything_ she is saying, but the alien’s eyes tell a different story, upending all of her previous assumptions.

Pearl’s eyes are looking backwards to a past Priyanka cannot see, not a world nor a planet beyond her reach.

So in this way, they are incredibly human.

She is.

She must have always been.

“So in a way, if—as you say—I’m passing on dreams to Connie, I’m only doing so because I was given dreams, too.”

And she’s not just looking towards the _past_ , Priyanka realizes.

For the past can mean many things.

(To some, everything.)

 _No_ , she has a vague suspicion that Pearl is looking towards Rose.

The doctor returns to her coffee cup, which has long grown lukewarm over the course of the conversation, but she takes a sip anyway.

Exhales slowly.

Watches as the moon begins to climb up the sky—full tonight, bright.

“Steven’s mother sounds like she was very…” She searches for the right word. “… inspirational.”

Not unlike her son.

Pearl’s eventual reply—quiet, almost inaudible—confuses more than it enlightens.

“She was complicated.”

It sounds like an admission.

**Author's Note:**

>  **@thesometimeswarrior:** It was so much fun to write this for you! Pearl and Priyanka both are amazingly intricate characters, and I tried to imagine the kind of dialogue they could stimulate by sharing their own insecurities and wants—the things that make them tick. I hope you enjoy! Thank you again for all that you've been to me these last couple of months—a _spectacular_ writer, an amazing reader, a friend. (As an aside, folks, if you haven't read some of her stuff yet, you totally should; she's incredible. Holy crap.)


End file.
